China may have started testing a railgun on naval vessel in the open sea zee

China may have begun experiments on the open sea with a railgun mounted on a naval vessel. A Weibo user has posted a photo of a Chinese ship on the open sea, which apparently has a railgun on the bow.

Weibo user HaoHan-Red Shark, who is also a prominent defense blogger, has published a photo of the Chinese landing ship Haiyan Shan, designated the Yuting-class by NATO. The photo shows a shape on the front of the ship that closely resembles the railgun that China reportedly tested last year. It is not known whether China has actually started testing the railgun in the open sea.

It is also unclear whether this is a working version of the weapon. Nothing has been confirmed from official channels. The photo is not definitive proof that there is a railgun on the ship at all, but it is probably the same ship that was also photographed in March last year, when it was at anchor. The photos clearly showed a railgun on the bow. The country would have already started tests by then.

As far as is known, the Chinese navy does not yet have an operational railgun, although this new photo seems to confirm that China is getting closer and closer to this point. The US Navy started testing a railgun in 2012, but that has not yet produced a working, operational example. Russia would also be working on the development of a railgun.

Railguns work by firing projectiles electromagnetically. The weapons have two rails in which a projectile or a metal case is placed in between. The acceleration of this is caused by a magnetic field, as a result of an enormous current that flows through the rails and the projectile.

The destructive power of a railgun comes from the kinetic energy of the projectile fired. Fired metal projectiles can reach a speed of about mach 5, although the US assumes that the Chinese experimental weapon is capable of firing projectiles at speeds above mach 7. Due to the enormous kinetic energy, explosives are basically no longer needed, which increases safety on board the ship. And its tremendous speed means it can hit targets hundreds of miles away.